Motorsport Ireland driver Josh McErlean secured his best finish in the World Rally Championship in fourth place, as Sebastien Ogier won at Rally Greece.
Toyota driver Ogier, who is a nine-time champion driving in a part-time campaign, prevailed over Hyundai’s Theirry Neuville in a thrilling battle.
Ogier held a 1.7 second advantage heading into the penultimate stage but Neuville picked up a puncture and lost just under one minute to drop out of the battle for the win.
Neuville still finished second, 58.3 seconds down on Ogier, and Takamoto Katsuta boosted his title hopes by coming home in third, ahead of M-Sport driver McErlean.
Championship leader Elyfyn Evans, whose charge up the order on Saturday was also halted by a puncture, finished in seventh.
After opening the road on Friday, a big disadvantage on the rocky, gravel stages in Greece, the Wales driver had recovered up the order and was challenging McErlean for fourth but a puncture on Saturday’s final dropped him to seventh, where he would finish the rally.
To add insult to injury for Evans, his nearest challenger Katsuta also claimed more Super Sunday and Power Stage points to cut the advantage at the top of the standings to just seven points.
After claiming maximum points in the rally, with the overall win and maximum points in both Super Sunday and the Power Stage, Ogier is now within 33 points of Evans.
“Things were looking pretty okay by Saturday afternoon. We struggled a bit with the puncture on the last one yesterday and another one this morning,” said Evans.
“I’m a bit disappointed this time, but that’s part of the game and we have to move on to the next one.”
Breakthrough for McErlean
In a breakthrough weekend forMcErlean, the only blemish for the 26-year-old and co-driver Eoin Treacy was a scare on the penultimate stage when he missed his braking point and lost 45 seconds as he recovered onto the road.
Despite that putting him in the grasp of the chasing SamiPajari, Adrien Fourmaux and Evans, McErlean kept his composure to hold onto fourth place in the final stage.
After a luckless start to the season, in which they had a best finish of eighth, McErlean far surpasses the trio of seventh-places from his debut WRC season last year.
McErlean and Treacy didn’t luck into their best finish, either. When they needed to show flashes of speed they did, and when they needed to control their pace the crew kept their heads.
“We definitely didn’t make it easy for ourselves but honestly, a massive thank to the whole team and every single person who kept believing in us,” an emotional McErlean said.
“It’s been a very tough start to the year and a big thanks to this man beside me [Treacy]. What a rally.”
For his M-Sport team-mate Jon Armstrong, it was another rally of what could have been.
Armstrong, from Northern Ireland, was running in third place and had just set his first fastest stage time in the WRC on Friday before he suffered a double puncture and a turbo failure on his Ford Puma Rally1, which forced him to retire.
The next rally takes place on the fast gravel roads in Estonia from 17-19 July.
Rally Greece results
1. Sebastien Ogier/Vincent Landris (Toyota) 3:36:40.7
2. Thierry Neuville/Martijn Wydaeghe (Hyundai) +58.3 seconds
3. Takamoto Katsuta/Aaron Johnston (Toyota) +3:04.8
4. Josh McErlean/Eoin Treacy (M-Sport Ford) +4:55.5
5. Sami Pajari/Marko Salminen (Toyota) +5:02.2
6. Adrien Fourmaux/Alex Coria (Hyundai) +5:08.7
7. Elfyn Evans/Scott Martin (Toyota) +5:54.9
….
20. Oliver Solberg/Elliott Edmundson (Toyota) +15:31.2
21. Jon Armstrong/Shane Byrne (Ford) +18:03.6
WRC drivers’ standings
1. Elfyn Evans (GB) 158 points
2. Takamoto Katsuta (Jap) 151
3. Sebastien Ogier (Fra) 125
4. Sami Pajari (Fin) 114
5. Oliver Solberg (Swe)103
6. Adrien Fourmaux (Fra) 97
7. Thierry Neuville (Bel) 95
…
11. Josh McErlean (Irl) 19
13. Jon Armstrong (Irl) 14
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